


you and i are too wise to woo peaceably

by Sniggy (Sniggyfrumps)



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Awkward Romance, F/F, F/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-09-02
Packaged: 2018-04-16 15:45:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4630950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sniggyfrumps/pseuds/Sniggy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bill Cipher decides to court the Pines Twins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sort of beholden to the idea that Bill wouldn't pick just one of the Pines Twins. Plus, there's not enough Bill/Mabel compared to the masses of BillDip. So, here's my not so secret ot3: Bill/Mabel/Dipper. Yep.

Dipper walks into the attic room as the autumnal orange light of the late sun barely filters through the thick Oregon forest into the Mystery Shack. He's leafing through several print-outs of the Black Knight satellite and detailed instructions on how to construct a simple radio receiver-transmitter out of kitchen utensils, and has to brush aside the array of chewed up pens and pencils, blue tack, staples and the large, bloodied antlers in order to spread out the papers on the cluttered desk at the end of his bed.

He pauses.

His brain finishes cluing in on the game of 'one of these things is not like the other' and Dipper promptly flails backwards, screaming in a pitch reserved for canine ears.

Falling on his arse, he quickly gathers himself and crawls over the floor, now littered with papers, and nears the desk.

Those aren't deer antlers.

For one, the shiny black mushrooms growing and pulsating on them are probably a clue. The antlers are enormous and serrated like shark's teeth and slick with black fluid, seemingly from the popped mushrooms? There's torn off pieces of fur clinging to the bloodied ends of the antlers, a good clue that whoever owned these didn't willing part with their natural headgear. The bone-white fur is matted with thick, dark clots of dry blood and mud, creating a gory checkerboard pattern.

Dipper consults his notes, and quickly finds this to be a rare species of the taurs that roam Gravity Falls. They don't shed their antlers, and they are extremely dangerous and irritable outside of the few days around the summer solstice when they emerge from their caves to mate.

Considering they're several months off from the solstice, this should be another good sign that the antlers aren't a simple case of Grunkle Ford mistaking Dipper's experiments with his own and dropping it off in his room.

Dipper pokes the black mushroom with his pen, and it oozes slightly. _Gross_.

\---

A couple days later, he's mindlessly pouring sugar into his coffee at the breakfast table before realising the mug and spoon are both dissolving into some sort of see-through slimy concoction. He slowly backs away, chair sliding over the log cabin floor, and gets down on all fours only to see what he thought was sugar eat its way through the floor and startle Grunkle Ford in the basement.

He pulls the jar aside and comes to realise it's not at all the sugar jar, but a similar-looking glass full of small, crystal-like pebbles, that when he looks closer, are actually hundreds of little angry skeletal jaws clicking and clacking away inside.

He slowly puts it down and backs away from the hole in the floor.

\---

The next days, more curious items appear inside the Shack, much to Dipper's chagrin.

A pickled brain of a rock-giant substitutes his pillow, leaving his hair clotted with gross cerebral juice in the morning. A tail of a selkie stinks up the whole bathroom in lieu of their towels. The claws of a chimera replace the nails that he usually hangs his jacket on. The head of a nightmare stares blankly at him from his closet. A dreamcatcher made from the natural silk formation of a giant moss spider (spider baby eggs included) wake him up in the middle of the night when the sticky resin drops onto his face.

After two weeks of this, Dipper's more than convinced that someone's out to murder him.

It all adds up. Warning signs interspersed with actual threats to his person. Dead heads on the nightstand? Definitely screams 'the Godfather' mythological-style.

Who could be behind this? He's not been out exploring since he and Soos started work on their radio tower in the back garden to contact aliens at night.

Could it be the shapeshifter? Could it be the--

Could it be some new enemy they nothing nothing of? Maybe this is only the beginning?

Dipper chews on the pencil, and spreads out a blank sheet of paper to start linking the different 'warnings' together and cross-reference their potential meaning in lore.

\---

Things take a turn for the creepy when he comes back to his attic room after grocery shopping to find an effigy of himself on his bed surrounded by black, wilted roses. The little doll-Dipper has black button eyes and a crudely stitched smile on the fabric that he's more or less sure isn't cloth, but some sort of skin, and the hair looks disturbingly real, and is probably a good clue as to where his old hairbrush got off to.

Dipper immediately backs out of the room, refusing to deal with the situation altogether, instead opting to sleep on the couch in the living room.

\---

"Going by those protective runes, I'm assuming your answer is 'no'?"

Dipper pauses, putting down the chalk and turns around to see Bill Cipher floating under the ceiling.

"I..."

He blinks.

"No, don't even begin. I'm too... I'm in _too much shit_ right now to deal with you spinning some deal on me I don't need," Dipper says and turns away, instead trying to make sense of the Latin phrases copied onto his arm with a black fountain pen. Maybe google-translating the

chants weren't going to be enough, but dammit, he's desperate.

Bill's eye frowns.

"I'm going to have to deal with these invaders that keep leaving gross threats and then see about protecting the Shack from--"

The triangle floats down in front of Dipper and examines the chalky writings on the floor.

"You've got your genitive cases mixed up, kid. That sigil is going to suck your soul into the crooked end of the succubus dimension, that is, if you're lucky and it doesn't just spawn a miniature black hole under your bed instead."

Dipper scowls, flustered, and immediately erases the offending words.

"Great, okay, can we do this later maybe? I've other things to worry about."

Bill's eye narrows.

"Wow, way to blow a guy off."

"Bill, the last time I saw you, you were trying to uproot time and space itself--and-- _and yet,_ I've got more pressing things on my mind, believe it or not," Dipper warbles, scribbling down a new line of archaic text. "Like trying to deter whoever's after me to leave the Shack alone and--"

Bill's eyes flashes red and his small hands shove into his side in a gesture of affront.

"Why, the _nerve!_ Who is it, huh? Who's got it in their head that they can call dibs on the Dip? I thought I'd made my intentions more than clear, but I guess pretending to be a gentleman never really does pay off when it comes to demons!"

The Twin stares at the demented triangle who continues to float around the room, raging.

"So what'd they give you, huh? I'd like to see what lower-rank bottom-feeder starseed think they can one-up me? Did they get you a cyclops brain anywhere nearly as depraved as the one I did? Hmm? Bet they couldn't even harvest the lobes without spoiling the childhood horrors, you leave that job to a _mind-demon,_ y'hear!"

The demon twirls around and points accusatory at the spider eggs still sticking to the ceiling.

"Do you have any idea how rare it is to find unspoiled Mind Spiders in this dimension? These are in their _prime!_ I'd like to see what second-hand garbage junk your other courtiers think they can hand off to you!"

Dipper carefully puts down the chalk and holy water.

"Bill," he says, trying desperately to catch up with the demon who seems miles ahead of him in the mental gymnastics. "Did _you_... leave these things?"

"Darn dippity, Dipper," the demon waves him off dismissively, seemingly more concerned with the idea of 'competition' and the sheer affront of such an idea.

"... _why?"_ Dipper asks, despite his gut telling him to get up and close himself in his closet for a good three hours until the world starts making sense again.

"Why? Isn't that _blindingly_ obvious?" Bill Cipher asks, poking at his eye and looking at Dipper like he's some sort of brain-damaged gopher.

"Pretend I'm stupid or something and explain," Dipper says, surly.

"Pretend?" Cipher replies smartly, eye crinkling in amusement.

Dipper throws up his arms. "Okay, fine, banishment ritual, here we come."

"Wow-wow, kid, you don't handle this romance stuff very well, do you? No wonder you're still cooped up in your uncle's attic instead of doing youthful human things like drunk-driving and having regretful coitus."

"That's _not--"_

The young man holds up his hands, as if trying to stop the situation from running away from him more than it already has.

"You left me these... things. As... _presents?"_

"Sure did!" the triangle replies, shining brightly in confidence. "Aren't I great?"

"The... heads and... carcasses?" Dipper continues, voice trembling a bit. "And the... voodoo doll?"

"Whodo? What? That's an Effigy of Keeping, you silly upright ape!" Bill says, eye rolling. "Wow, It's like you've regressed! I coulda sworn humans got smarter as they aged--maybe that's another conspiracy of your government, hahah! Betcha thought the mind-bending stopped at MKULTRA!"

"Bill..." Dipper pinches the bridge of his reddening nose, feeling like his brain is trying to escape out his ears. "Were you... _hitting_ on me?"

"Hitting comes after the safewords, kiddo," Bill replies saucily, and Dipper's sure he's sprung a mental leak because he swears Bill winked at him like a preteen girl attempting to flirt.

"This is so fucking surreal," Dipper says out loud, to one in particular, or maybe to the God's of Reason who have presumably discarded him forever.

"Stranger things have happened than someone trying to court you, but I get where you're coming from," the demon replies, "although, don't be so hard on yourself; you're not that unappealing, if one squints at your good side and ignores most of what comes outta your mouth."

"Courting, he says," Dipper grits out, getting up from the floor and trotting to his research desk. "Sounds more like you're here to make me kick your angles out of shape."

Were all the weird esoteric stuff... _courting gifts?_ And Bill had poofed into their dimension to get his... answer?

Dipper drags both hands down his face, feeling like he needs a fucking adult.

"What gives?" he says finally, as Bill seems to have given him some space to think things over. "I thought you _hated_ Mabel and I after that summer when we... you know. Ruined your plans and everything?"

Bill shrugs his small spindly arms and poofs his cane into existence, twirling it thoughtfully.

"You win some, you lose some. I don't exactly have the patience to hold long grudges. Or the mental preoccupation, ahah! Plus, I wouldn't want to deprive my mystery-loving twins of their _all-time favourite_ Mystery!"

"You... wait. _Twins_. As in, plural. As in, Mabel too?"

The young brunette feels the floor disappear under him as he loses balances and falls into the wobbly desk chair.

"Of course, Pine Tree! You're a package deal, after all! Just because you're split up don't mean I don't intend to get the full Pines experience!" Bill says like there's absolutely nothing fucking wrong with that sentiment.

There's a billion questions flooding Dipper's mind. About a million of them are just incoherent screaming ending in a question mark.

Dumbly, he says: "What did you get her?"

Bill swings his cane, looking sheepish.

"Aw, you know. The hooves of a unicorn, the bloody smile of a faerie and the tortured souls of a couple elf queens. I'm a sucker for romance!"

Dipper blinks. This is all too much.

"Can I... uh," he coughs, trying to shake off the high-pitched note of panic in his voice. "Can I... call you back later on this? I uh... have to think it over some more."

Bill frowns.

"Ugh... fine. But don't take too long, I'm not sticking around this dead-end of the universe only to have you awkwardly come up with reasons why I'm too good for you. I already know I am!"

There's a flash of light and, then, Dipper juts awake from the chair as the world washes over with colour again. He sits, immobile, swallowing the same lump in his throat over and over.

He lunges for his cell.

\---

"Meow?" Mabel squawks happily as she puts the call on speaker-phone to continue her practical course-work around the piles of glowy-eyed skull-necklaces and flower crowns made of frosted-over thornvines recently left in her tiny student flat.

"Mabel? It's me. We've _got_ to talk."


	2. i wish my horse had the speed of your tongue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we are officially in multi-chapter fic territory. oy vey. also, writing mystery twins dialogue is my greatest joy.

"--did you just say your mattress were replaced by a werewolf hide?"

"Do not _even_ get me started on the rest of the bed!"

Mabel has been making good progress at combating and conquering University life and adorning herself with the 'young adult' label with gusto, with all the responsibilities and mostly, the fun that it entailed.

Splitting off from Dipper for the first and longest time since... ever, has been exactly as painful and relieving as they both had expected it to be. Regular phone and video calls alleviated the strain until they could spend time together over breaks and vacations.

She is used to hearing from Dipper every weekend to play catch-up on his practical internship with Grunkle Ford in Gravity Falls, so when he called in a frantic tiff she fully expected to hear about some new experiment gone wrong or how he'd accidentally walked in on Grunkle Ford waxing his ears in the bathroom.

The distressed diatribe about demonic romance and organs being delivered wrapped in bouquets is, admittedly, a bit out of left field.

"--a, a dozen barghest toes, dried up and left like--like--christmas lights around my bed, the _smell--"_

As she listens to Dipper's tragic venting, Mabel chews on her pink lipgloss (it's raspberry/watermelon, and it is _delicious_ ) and tries to avoid the niggling feeling that her current situation somewhat mirrors her twin's.

It had started, like most social disasters, insidiously small.

At first, she'd found that the usual gaggles of guys who cheered and waved at girls at the University were starting to avoid her. She thought maybe she weren't wearing short enough skirts or that brunettes weren't 'in' anymore or that the guys were all suffering collective brain damage because hello she was adorable and who wouldn't whistle at this gorgeous sweater princess?

Then, the guys and girls in her classes who she'd marked down in her 'university romances' scrapbook as 'totally into me oh my gosh' were starting to sit further and further away from her, turn her heads, and actively avoiding eye contact even if she were standing right beside them and batting them over the head with her fine arts textbook.

... figuratively, of course.

She's come home from woodworking class to find a litter of dead, pink bugs arranged in a chocolate box. She'd assumed they were some weird delicacy from somewhere she had no hope of pronouncing, courtesy of a shy admirer (just like in her books, ohhhh my god) and just shoved them into a cupboard for sharing on movie night with the gang.

The following day, someone had apparently splurged on Ebay because on the edge of her bathroom sink sat a crystal skull which quickly become a hat stand slash holder for the wigs from her drama club slash fashionable conversation piece.

Over the next weeks, more and more curiously macabre gifts popped up in her flat, assuming from her dubbed 'shy goth crush'. Maybe it was  a sexy vampire this time around! That's why she never saw them leave the presents! ... nevermind that vampires aren't allowed to enter without permission... the jury is still out on the verdict of it being a hot ghost instead. That would be so rad. Dipper would be super jealous. Mostly because of the ghost part, not so much the romance. Dipper is weird that way.

"--glowing mushrooms in your closet? You sure that isn't just you forgetting to shower again?" she jabs playfully, rolling around on the carpet and ignoring the steady feeling of dread pooling in her stomach.

 _"Har_ , but then when I finally get the candles for a purification ritual, guess who shows up?!"

"A hot vampire ghost?" Mabel asks hopefully.

"What? No! _Bill!_ Bill Cipher! As in _demon!_ As in, it was him all along! All the weird stuff, the gifts, the--the threats--they were _romantic!_ Threats of _romance,_ Mabel!"

Mabel spits out the lip gloss and it propels through the room and hits a jar of siren song square on, rustling the distressed voices inside something fierce.

_"Whaaaaat?"_

"I know! Oh my gosh, Mabel, please don't tell me you've got all sorts of weird stuff at your place too?"

"What..." Mabel squints and hesitates, pushing away the jars and gift-wrapped contents of what is apparently acceptable demon dating dowry--some of it squeaks and growls in response. "... would you say entails... 'weird'?"

"Uh, you know, nail clippings of chupacabra, skull necklaces--" Mabel quietly tosses the necklace she'd been mindlessly toying with behind the couch. "--scented candles made of demon earwax, that sort of stuff."

"Uh-oh," Mabel whispers.

"What's that?"

"Nothing, everything is fine and normal here, don't know what's up with you and Bill, though, that sounds super weird, hahahahaha!" she parrots tinnily.

"Mabel, I can easily recognise your strained fake laugh--"

"Fake-shmake, I am a barrel of absolutely genuine Mabel Merriment!"

"Seriously, Mabes, Bill Cipher heavily implied he was gonna 'get the full Pines experience'," Dipper replied with an audible shudder in his voice. "... whatever that's supposed to mean. If you've been noticing anything strange around your sorority, you should totally talk to me about it!"

Mabel pulls a tie-dye cushion from the couch and slips it under her chest, heaving a sigh into the phone.

"Ugh... this sucks... I just. I'd hoped I'd be over the 'gross paranormal suitor' gig once that summer was over and University life started."

"You _just_ said something about 'hot vampire ghosts' earlier."

"Emphasis on _hot_. I don't want some sadistic one-eyed piece of alien geometry trying to date me! Why would I want _that?_ I'm not gonna date a _gnome_ , and I'm sure as heck not gonna date Bill Cipher! What are we gonna _do_ , Dipper?"

Dipper scratches the modest fluff on his chin and awkwardly repositions the phone to his ear. Oh boy. This is the part of the conversation he's been dreading.

"Um... Mabel, I--"

"I mean, you called me all up in a tiff, so we're gonna figure this out together, right?"

"Er... yeah, about that--"

Noticing the hesitant lilt in her twin's voice, Mabel sits up, grabbing the phone between her hands and all but pleading cum yelling into the display.

"Ohhh, please please tell me you already have found some sort of 'demon repellant', like Axe bodyspray, but for Bill Cipher!"

"Actually..."

Mabel bites her lower lip. That's Dipper's 'it's complicated' tone. Which usually means _he's_ going to make things needlessly complicated.

"I was thinking of... seeing where this goes, first."

The line goes dead.

Dipper swallows, pretty sure he's never heard Mabel go from verbally sixty hours a mile to zero, in like, moments.

Cautiously, he pipes up: "Mabel?"

"..."

"Mabel, you still with me?"

"Whoever you are, put Dipper back on the line--"

"Mabel--"

"--or I swear I will come on over and team up with our grunkles and personally kick your butt, you--"

_"Mabel!"_

"Dipper!" Mabel yells back, agitated.

"I'm serious, Mabel!" Dipper exclaims.

"I _know_ you are! That's the problem!" she screeches, grabbing at her bouncy hair in tufts, irritated and confused. "You just spent _minutes_ complaining about--about--shrunked heads left on your doorstep and dead flowers and stuff! And you're telling me you're actually _serious?_ What the heckie, Dip-Dye?"

Dipper drags hands down his face and back up into his hair, feeling a mixture between embarrassment and a weird feeling of self-righteousness.

"It's just--I dunno, you've got so many stories of guys and girls chasing after you, giving you attention, and it's, after a while it gets--it's--it's nice feeling _wanted_ for once, you know?

"Dipper, you can do _so much better,_ believe me. If you really wanna meet people there are thousands of ways that don't involve Bill Cipher." She reaches for her sticker-plastered phonebook. "If you wanted a date or a hangout you shoulda just asked me, I have tons of phone numbers from friends and people around campus."

"Mabel--" Dipper starts, fearing that he's losing control of the conversation.

"Like, there's tons of science-y nerdy gals in my neighbouring sorority! You can nerd out together, have chats about... algebra and... your dull board games and have things in common and all that good stuff that makes up a proper romance--"

"I know you're just trying to help, but I don't really--"

"Okay, fine!" Mabel says quickly, pushing her phonebook aside and reaching for her laptop. "Dating sites! They're perfect for goofy shut-ins like you!"

 _"Wow,_ okay--"

"Speed-dating! Teen magazine penpal section! Anonymous chatrooms--literally anything else is a better option!"

"I thought romance was, like, your number one favourite thing aside from me."

"Yeah, Dipper, and _I'm_ telling you, this is a _baaaaaad idea!"_ Mabel says, making her point firmly and thoroughly.

Pinching the bridge of his nose, Dipper isn't sure if he's more exasperated with himself or his sister at this point. Possibly both.

"Okay, however, hear me out on this."

"Alright, fine, I am prepared to be unconvinced, though."

Mabel crosses her arms and puts the phone down in her lap, glaring at it and huffing angrily, and although Dipper can't see her, the gesture of cross disapproval is practically audible in her voice.

"So, okay, I am, like, the _very first_ to acknowledge that Bill Cipher is probably not on either of our lists of uh..."

"Acceptable partners? Acceptable _persons?"_ Mabel states sourly.

"Don't be, uh, species-est?" Dipper frowns. "Anyway--I'd agree that this would _never_ have occurred to me if it wasn't for Bill setting his heart on this--do demons have hearts? Does Bill even have insides? I mean he's--"

"I don't ever want to think about Bill's inside bits, Dipper, gross."

"Yeah, yeah, nevermind," Dipper says waving his hand as if to dispel the notion. "The thing is... now that the idea has been introduced... and I've had a bit of time to think it over, I guess, I guess what I'm saying is that I'm sort of... curious? Intrigued? Like... being courted by a demon! Who can say they've done _that?_ Grunkle Ford certainly can't! Think of the _data!_ Think of what we could _learn!_ I could finally start writing my own journals! It's _too good_ to pass up!"

Mabel makes a disgruntled face at her phone display, perfectly envisioning Dipper's happy-but-entirely-misplaced-excitement with the idea of Bill courting them.

"Wow, Dipper, that's so... I think this is even worse than if you'd said you suddenly got all hot for making out with the demon that mangled your preteen body."

"M-making-- _ugh_ Mabel!" Dipper gags noisily at the idea. "What the _hell?"_

"What the hell yourself?! That's totally dishonest, Dipper! You'd string Bill along just to get your science jollies? That's so shallow!"

"My... _what._ Also, since when are you on Bill's side?"

"Since my brother's a vapid jerk, since!"

"He's a demon! Who _cares!"_

"Bill does, apparently! And you're gonna throw it back into his face? What do you think he'll do once you get to Make-out Point and instead of lip-balm, you get out your pen and notepad? 'Hoop-boop, waitta minute Bill, I gotta write up a graph first so I can scale our kissitude'--"

"Seriously, stop talking about kissi--"

"He's gonna zap another hole in your gut, Dipper, _permanently!"_

The line goes silent with Mabel huffing after her outburst, and Dipper, tensely contemplating.

"You're right. This is wrong. Immoral. Despite whatever passes for morality for demons. And it's also reckless."

Nodding Mabel adds: "These are all true things that you just said."

"But," Dipper adds, "you also keep telling me I need to go with the flow more, so, I'm _still_ going to accept Bill's courtship--"

_"What."_

_"Byetalktoyoulater--"_ Dipper speedily rants into the phone, slides the display to end the call and hastily buries it under his new (and gross) cyclops-brain-pillow (this is his life now, apparently), ignoring the vehement buzzing of Mabel no re-dialing the hell out of his number.

Hundreds of miles away, Mabel stares at her phone in absolute shock before furiously throwing the pillow at the wall with a thud.

_"DIPPER!"_


	3. i can see he's not in your good books

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there are many fics in which bill inhabits a suave human body for whatever reasons. this is not one of those.

Mabel were sure that she's going to hear from Bill Cipher herself eventually. Now that Dipper's spilled the beans, she can't be long for an impromptu visit from the obnoxious dream demon.

To 'check up on her'.

After all, Bill is _always watching,_ and if he's approaching this whole 'romance' thing the way Mabel is suspecting he is, he's seeing it as a plan unfurling according to plan (the same way Dipper seeing it as an 'experiment') and her own resistance is only a minor obstacle.

Of course, she couldn't have foreseen how the demon decided to contact her.

Mabel had been calling on Dipper all evening but her stubborn twin had either shut off his phone or were persistently ignoring her while busy making one of his overcomplicated and counterproductive plans himself.

She scoffs to herself. Those two with their plans. It's almost like they deserved each other. Almost.

Sighing, Mabel adjusts the ringed planner on her lap. She's currently lounging with an array of more or less finished homework under one of the broad, droopy elm trees on the campus park grounds, watching people slowly exit the theatre building with an array of costumes to bring home for improvement and repairs. She taps the calendar pages and bites her lip. More than ever, she wants to visit Dipper in Gravity Falls. If Bill's going to be around, she wants to be there with her twin. Even if the demon's intentions are seemingly innocent. Or at least, void of dimensional destruction. Well, that remained to be seen. Mabel can't imagine Bill Cipher without at least a little bit of mindless chaos.

Which makes this whole 'courting' jig so odd. She hates being the paranoid twin, but surely the demon is going to have another motive for this comedy of errors. Like, get her and Dipper in a weak spot and then...? Sell of their souls for pocket money or kick them into a hell dimension full of rabid badgers with mouths for eyes!

Mabel shakes her head. She wants to visit for Winter Break, and they'd discussed it before, but as things are, she simply can't afford the bus fare. Books and tuition are darned expensive. Maybe Bill should have tried to court her with discount coupons to the book store and grocery store instead.

The wind is getting chilly, after all, Autumn is coming to a close, so Mabel pulls her sweater down over her knees, and begins to chew on the turtle-neck, pondering her odd predicament.

"Why, _hello there,_ little lady--!"

Mabel blinks at the tiny shadow barely looming over her knees, and looks up slightly to find what looks like a barely seven years old boy grin down at her.

Scratch that, he's downright leering. She awkwardly pulls at her pooling sweater neck.

The voice isn't the high-pitched cutesy tone of a little kid, and the eyes are a bit... not blinking. At all.

Mabel's face immediately washes over with silent dread and annoyance.

"Bill."

"Shooting Star!" the little kid cheers, dimply round cheeks not at all hiding the demonic glint in his yellowed eyes. He's got a round mane of beautiful black curls, and his skin looks healthily brown, but there's this skin-deep uneasiness settling in the pool of Mabel's stomach at seeing a teensy kid as a vessel for an immortal, psychopathic demon.

Smirking at her unabashed staring the kid whispers suggestively: "Like whatcha see, doll-face?" and twirls a lock of the bouncy afro around a plump finger while rocking back and forth on his heels.

The uneasiness blooms into full-tilt disgust in the few moments it takes for Mabel to fully come to terms with the fact that a possessed seven-year old is hitting on her.

"Oh, _ewww, Bill!"_ she squeals, and kicks herself back against the tree trunk as Gideon flashbacks from long ago floods her. "Seriously, oh my god."

The kid blinks at her, somewhat perturbed.

"What? You _like_ meat-bags with this particular colour skin and fun frizzy hair! I know this for a fact," he states, almost petulantly daring her to say otherwise.

Mabel almost hiccups a laugh. It'd be funny if it wasn't so... you know. Gross.

"Yeah, and you'd be cute if I were still, like, a kid. Ugh, this is terrible, even for you--"

The Bill-kid shoves his hands into his sides, and cocks his hips in a gesture of sassy discontent.

"So, give or take a _couple years--"_

_"Ten!"_

"Humans look the same the first thirty years anyway! No wrinkles, smooth skin--"

"A _bit_ of change in height and weight..." Mabel mumbles into her sweater.

Bill-kid throws his hands to the heavens as to protest the unreasonable girl that is Mabel Pines.

"And here I though _Pine Tree_ would be the difficult one!"

"Well, you thought _wrong!"_ Mabel snaps back, somewhat insulted at the low-key insinuation she'd be easy to woo. She likes romance and flirting around and maybe a bit more than that, too, yeah, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have standards, dammit.

And this, right here? Is preeeetty much below even the lowest of her standards.

To say nothing of the poor kid's spirit that must be bawling his eyes out somewhere.

"I can't _believe_ you," she says. "You should have just invaded my dreams instead of tricking an innocent kid into being your puppet. Why'd you think this would be a good idea?"

The Bill-kid smiles at her, all confidence and tricksy bastard wiles returned.

"Welllll--this specific meatsack might not be working on you, but that doesn't mean the next one won't!" He sidles up to her, leaning against the tree trunk and flips at the front page of her planner, which has a photo of her most (current) favourite lead singer with sun-kissed naked abs proudly on display. "Something like this might go over better, huh?"

_Oh... that wouldn’t be so bad--_

Mabel instantly swats Bill over the nose with her calendar.

"No! Bad demon! _Bad!_ No body-snatching in the name of love!" she scolds, hiding her guilty conscience.

The little kid makes wobbly motions at shoving Mabel away, but quickly finds the stumpy arms severely lacking. "Ugh, this body is the worst!" he exclaims.

"You might be tiny and adorable, but I have the power of maturity on my side," Mabel declares, swiftly shoving pencils and books into her school bag.

Rubbing his sore nose, looking chastised, Bill-kid sends her a glare.

"I see your point about the age, doll. I'll be sure to pick one with at least a couple wrinkles and much longer arms next time."

"How about, _no time_ at all?" Mabel quips and grabs the kid's hand, walking towards the paths with a quick gait.

Bill-kid blinks, but follows willingly, albeit at a bit of stumbling pace as his smaller legs can barely keep up with Mabel's stride.

"Ohh, is the body working suddenly?" he grins and wiggles his fingers in her grasp.

"Gross!" Mabel yelps and lets go immediately, spinning around to bop Bill-kid on the nose. "And no! Of course not! But! I'm not going to just shoo you off and leave some little kid without a body somewhere. We're going to return it where you found--took it!" she says sternly, pursing her lips and putting on her best serious face.

"I like this _'we'_ business," Bill-kid replies smarmily, the tone sending another wave of nausea over Mabel.

"You're making my skin crawl," she deadpans, and shudders visibly.

Wiggling his fingers at her like little pervy spider legs and making a lewd face that really doesn't fit the angelic cherub features of the kid, Bill says: "I wouldn't mind crawling over your skin--"

"Okay, _no_ , this stops now," Mabel squeaks, and shoves her hand into her jeans pocket.

"What, this is typical human courting practice!" Bill-kid insists stubbornly, face squashed against her palm. "Exchange of sexual innuendoes to proclaim interest! It's my favourite part!"

"Yeah, well, it's _in your_ best _end_ -game to shut up and chew on this instead," Mabel declares and fishes out a bag of oversized taffy. She fists a hand in the candy and brings up a handful of it and immediately shoves it into Bill-kid's mouth.

He immediately goes silent with wide-eyed, slow mastication, and Mabel is blessed with at least a couple moments of silence. After all, this used to work on her all the time. Well, it... still does, to be totally honest.

Mabel weighs her options. She could take Bill-kid to the police station down town, but that would mean getting on the bus with him flabbing his giant mouth everywhere and probably predicting at least a dozen stranger's deaths on the way or revealing embarrassing personal wet dreams of the passengers on the bus.

Ugh, better to just pry the location of the kid's spirit out of the demon.

Mabel wipes her forehead and adorns an adorable smile.

Bill-kid looks at her curiously, incessant chewing and bulging cheeks notwithstanding.

"Yef?" he prompts, spittle running down his chin. Charming.

"I know you probably came here to talk, how about--" she says, careful to sound as least a little bit diplomatic, "--we talk about your weird courting gig on the way to wherever you stole this kid's body from?"

"Din't steal nuffin," Bill-kid grins cleverly, and the sight is all the more horrible now that his smile is filled with half-eaten, pink sweets.

"Yeah, you got it fair and square by trading him some shiny Pokémon cards, I'm sure!"

"Thas's nof faroff!"

"Man, watching you brings back so many bubblegum-in-braces nightmares," Mabel admits.

"Those were hilarious!" Bill-kid exclaims happily, swallowing a sizeable chunk of the sweets in one go.

Mabel blows him a raspberry between her now perfect teeth, and grabs Bill-kid under the shoulder and picking him up to sit on her hip.

"I don't think I should trust you _not_ throw this kid into traffic or something," she explains, but Bill seems to be perfectly enchanted with the idea of riding her around, and slings a much too friendly arm around her neck and presses his little round kiddie cheek against hers.

"You're coming around," he sing-songs happily. "I knew this body was a good pick! Small, big-headed humans are universally adored!"

Mabel's face falls, and she's almost tempted to drop him head-first onto the sidewalk. She would've if it weren't for the fact that this body is only on-loan, and neither the kid nor his parents would appreciate it being returned with a mild concussion.

She doesn't usually react so acidly to everything, but being separated from Dipper for so long and so consistently has her very much on edge. She's had great times with friends and more than friends on campus, but nothing really makes her feel at peace the same way Dipper's company does. She misses him terribly, even if the first thing she's going to do is bonk him on the head for even entertaining Bill's weird ideas in the first place.

Speaking of it, Bill Cipher's very much uninvited attention is bringing out the sourpuss in her, much to her dismay.

"Okay," she says, forcing on a gentler disposition. "Where to, then?"

"Oh? I dunno. I wasn't paying attention."

_"Bill."_

"Gimme," the possessed boy counters, waggling his fingers in a grabby motion at Mabel's jeans pocket.

"What? Oh--I guess that makes sense," Mabel says, and hands the demon the candy bag. She would've done the same, even at age twenty.

Happy with his sugary payment, Bill-kid points across the city centre, to a row of town houses over on the nearby hill. It'll be a brisk half an hour walk, but it'll be better than chancing Bill's mischievous ass on public transport.

If she's lucky, Bill will be occupied with the candies and won't somehow choke on them because he forgot what holes foodstuff goes down into. On second hand, perhaps giving Bill the taffy might've been a bad idea.

Not the sort to dwell, Mabel starts down the street, pulling Bill-kid up a bit to lean on her hip as she trots onward.

"I guess I can't be mad at you for long," Mabel sighs.

"Oh, _I_ know you can't," Bill replies easily, now genuinely interested for the first time since he found her.

"Thinking back on when you were Bipper, you really didn't seem to know better. About human bodies, I mean. I guess I shouldn't have expected you to know the difference between a little kid and a... well, someone my age. Plus, the last time you saw us... that we know of," she glances at Bill who smiles back innocently like a little shithead. "... yeah, well, we were like, _twelve_. Tiny li'l cuties."

"Heheheh, yeah," Bill replies, eerily cheery, and Mabel instantly decides not to pursue that line of thought.

Hastily, she arrives at her point: "Anyway, I guess I can't be mad at you for hecking up some li'l kid's body. You're like a bad body high-jacking demon puppy that just don't know better."

Bill-kid pats her cheek fondly. "See, this is why I like you, Shooting Star. Very quick on the uptake, despite what your brother thinks."

"Stop that," Mabel replies quietly, and firmly, swatting his head away.

"Stop what?" Bill-kid replies innocuously.

"Stop talking for Dipper, firstly. Don't try to play us against each other. I don't even know why'd you'd think that would work again. And, more importantly, stop pretending like you care."

He cocks his head and makes big eyes at Mabel.

She sighs and readjusts her grip on him, stopping at a crosswalk for the light to turn green. She tries to avoid Bill's questioning look by following the cars that drive by, trying to catch little glimpses of the people in the front seat, as if she could be taken away from Bill's kooky scheme with them.

"You've got some weird idea that we can be talked into... some awful, devious project of yours. I dunno. I dunno really what you're doing, honestly. Most of the time, nobody does; but I know for sure that it isn't anything to do with caring, about Dipper, or me, about us, or--or love." Even muttering the word under her breath in passing relation to anything of Bill's doing is unnatural and makes her hair stand on end. It's all so messed-up. "All these presents and weird junk--that's just... stuff. You don't really care."

Instead of acting tough-as-nails or laughing in her face, Bill-kid eerily replies with a simple: "You said it yourself, doll, You don't know what I'm doing."

"I know what... romance is, and what you're doing is all material. There's no heart behind it."

Bill sends her a weird look. Somewhere between pitying and patronizing.

"I don't have a heart. I'm a demon, toots."

"Yeah, that doesn't help either. You might be following the steps like one of Dipper's dumb lists, but you don't know what really goes into love. He probably thinks the same, which is why he's treating this like some crazy science experiment."

Bill-kid grins sharply at her. "Why, dropping me some juicy intel on your brother, there?"

Mabel waves him off, wishing for the light to change soon so she can get moving again. She feels restless, and caught by Bill's piercing smirk.

"Oh, like you didn't already know that Creep-Meister 'I'll be watching you'. Neither of us are taking you seriously."

"You'll be wiser in time, kiddies," Bill says with certainty. "I'm perfectly serious."

"What's there to take seriously?" Mabel says to the contrary. "Gifts and flirting does not a romance make."

She crosses the road quickly, and starts down the boulevard to the townhouses and quieter area of the city centre.

"Granted, demon romance is a bit convoluted and territorial and bothersome and not something I'd usually bother with," Bill replies. "But there are a lot of overlaps with the convoluted and bothersome parts of _human_ romance."

Mabel cocks a brow. "Such as?"

"You pick a target, and make them yours. Till death do them into parts," Bill-kid smiles widely and unblinkingly at her, and plops another piece of taffy into the side of his mouth.

The urge to drop the creepy little twerp onto the tarmac and run for the hills returns with a vengeance.

"See? That, _right there_ , is why I'm not into this at all."

"Your light box thing changed colour," Bill says smugly.

Scowling, Mabel crosses the road hastily, as taffy paper scatters behind them in a litter-snowfall.

"You're the _worst,"_ Mabel asserts as she catches him throwing another piece. "From body-snatching to littering?"

"I'm a demooon!" Bill drawls, his catch-all apology phrase.

"Yeah, but you could _not_ be a litter-Hitler," Mabel, grabbing the empty taffy bag out of the demon-boy's grasp. "And you didn't even leave any for me! You _are_ Satan!"

Bill guffaws and jumps out of her hold, choosing to stretch his tiny-boy legs and stick his fingers into his mouth.

"This stuff is great! I love how it sticks to the roof of my human mouth like some sort of hellish leech!" he proclaims happily.

Mabel pouts. "Glad to hear it."

"Is this how you save up food for winter?"

"Either that or stuff it under the floorboards so our parents can find it. If you're a little kid. Which I _am not,"_ Mabel reasserts, hands on hips. "I put it in my bedside drawer, like _an adult."_

"Yeesh, is this about this meatsack's 'age'? again" again Bill replies, making air-quotes and a grimace walking in front and away from her.

"If you know so much about human romance," Mabel says, quickly walking in tandem with Bill-kid again. "How can you not know that small kids and big adults are super much a no-no?"

"Oh, Shooting Star, one day you'll die--you could always make a deal with me and I'll let you know when--and become a ghost and float into the vastness of space with the other incorporeal gases of the universe and you'll realise how useless it is to get uppity about time when your silly subspecies is like a tiny blip on the universal radar. But until then, just remember that time is superpolynomial, paradoxical, cyclical and dilative all at once."

Mabel blinks.

"Oh."

"Try not to worry about it, kid. Luckily, that's your species' forté, anyway."

Rubbing her arm, feeling somewhat dwarfed in the face of Bill's torrential word vomit, Mabel bites her lip.

Bill smiles pleasantly at her, all teeth. "That's a nice look on you," he says.

Mabel deadpans. "What? Existentialist fear of my place in the world?"

"That's the one!" Bill winks at her, wagging a finger in her direction. "It makes a demon just wanna rip out your soul and keep it in a lava lamp! I love those things! So dateless! So fashionable! So not at all full of lava! Crazy!"

"Your flirting needs work," Mabel says, not really impressed with the demon’s apparent handiness. "Maybe just go back to piling up macabre gifts at my doorstep."

"I'll have you know my flirting is impeccable throughout the universes," Bill insists.

"Not in this one, obviously!" Mabel counters flippantly. "Humans don't like having their soul bits and body bobs used in demon do-it-yourself projects!"

"They don't? That's so backwards!"

"I don't think I wanna know about demon romance," Mabel replies. "It sounds pretty terrifying!" Dipper reaaaally doesn't know what he's getting himself into. Them into. There's no way she's going to let him do this alone. If she has to play chaperone for the first time in her dating life, who better to do it for than her twin brother?

"Oh, it's not too bad. That is, you do have plenty of dream catchers, right? Gotta have 'protection', or you could catch a nasty mind rash if you dally with too many demons at once in the Dreamscape!"

"Don't you start with the _'birds and the bees and the devils'_ ," Mabel exclaims, plugging her ears in mock disgust, even though she's half-serious. Getting a freakish sex-talk isn't any less of a horrifying prospect than when Grunkle Stan mistakenly gave it to her as a tween.

"Next time you'll have to make a deal for the deets," Bill informs her seriously, walking and inspecting his tiny kid fingers. "I've been plenty magnanimous with you today, because I like you, toots, however, this gracious streak sure ain't gonna last."

"Huh... Then--then answer me this--" Mabel says, grabbed by a sense of urgency.

Bill-kid gives her a lazy glance. "Y'huh?"

"Please tell me this is all just some dumb joke--a part of one of your big schemes and you're just trying to make us 'join your side' or some garbage like that."

"Heh, denial, huh? Another cute look on you," Bill-kid replies smoothly, cracking his knuckles. "Why so eager to doubt me?"

Mabel flinches at the noise.

"Well, not only are you a total liar and cheater--" Bill laughs loudly, pleased as punch. "--but the idea of dating you is way scarier than any of the stuff that happened to Dipper and I in Gravity Falls."

The kid rolls around on his heel, walking backwards clumsily as he looks Mabel straight in the eyes--yellow snake-pupils boring into her brown and soft ones.

"See? That's why you're the fun one, Shooting Star."

Mabel shudders involuntarily.

 

* * *

 

"This is the house, then?"

"Sure is, dollface."

"Maybe lose the Don Juan attitude."

Bill-kid, appropriately enough, makes a rude face at her and sits on the steps, eyeing the sharp cast-iron spikes on the yard's gate a bit too curiously.

Mabel hastily knocks on the front door, with a loud "Excuse me?"

The door immediately explodes into the visage of a large, teary-eyed woman

"André! Come here, little bug!" she cries out. Mabel only has a minute to catch a view of Bill's more or less aghast facial expression before the woman barrels over her, arms outstretched. Scooping up her child, a torrent of tears intermingling with heartfelt scolding and joyful pet names falls from her eyes and mouth.

Mabel, backed up against the opposite side of the stair railing, giggles into her hands.

Leaving Bill to his deserved smothering, she notices, out of the corner of her eye, movement: a little red ball rolling around the bushes near the gate they'd entered.

Rolling around on its own. As if pushed by an invisible force.

"Oh," Mabel breathes. "Oh no."

 

* * *

 

She keeps watching the little red ball putter about the yard even as she sits by the kitchen window, drinking milk and eating homemade lemon tarts by the pound. Bill's in a kiddie chair across from her, looking ready to commit murder, arson and matricide in no particular order.

"I hate this horrible contraption," he hisses, tiny fat, useless kid fingers scrabbling over the bright blue plastic baby-lock on the chair. "Human torture inventions are above and beyond!"

"You were right though," Mabel smiles at him, cake in her mouth. "I can't resist you like this, you are adorable."

She reaches over the plastic plate adorned with baby animals and pinches his cheek. He's got a bib on. There's a li'l duck on it.

"I will make balloon animals out of your grandchildren's innards," Bill hisses.

"Shush, cuties like you can't be heard saying naughty things like that!" Mabel replies and shoves an entire tart into Bill-kid's mouth, watching him choke and glare at her with quiet glee.

"Always such an appetite," Hannah, the mother, mentions as she puts down a plate of candied apples. "Where did you say you found him, honey?"

"Just walking outside my campus, ma'am," Mabel replies politely, shining happily at the woman. "He weren't in any trouble, just seemed like he'd wandered off and couldn't find his way home!" She doesn't want to alarm the mother, nor get the child into any more trouble.

"I can't thank you enough, sweetheart," Hannah gushes and pets Mabel's shoulder. "Please, if you could stay for dinner, we'd be happy to have you."

"Oh--I don't know..."Mabel glances out the window, at the red ball.

"I get it it, you're young and busy," the woman laughs it off. "Just give it some thought, is all. Erika will be home soon and she's often out so it'd be lovely to have a real family dinner with you."

"Awhh, welll," Mabel melts.

Bill sputters and claws at the bib.

"Erika's a trucker, you know, she gets real far and wide around the country. She's coming back home from delivering to Oregon, imagine!"

Mabel cocks her head. "Oregon, huh?"

The woman nods affirmatively.

"Yeah, Gravity Falls, Oregon. She'll have to go back in a few weeks for winter, and then she's all ours again for the holidays."

"You... don't say."

Mabel glances at the red ball which has quieted its movements, then back at Bill. He grins back at her, winking, and then, the body of the young child goes slack in the chair.

In the next moment, the child bounces back up, eyes alight with childish shock and alarm whereas Mabel's goes dark with anger as a few puzzle pieces click into place.


	4. no, and if he were i would burn my library

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the thick plottens etc

"Mabel?" Dipper tentatively answers the phone, and gets ready to recite his elaborate apology monologue. "listen, I know I--"

"It's okay Dipper," Mabel answers, her voice curt.

Oh boy. She must be livid. Better go straight for the apology.

"I'm sorry," he says. "I was trying to convince myself of what I was doing before I tried to convince you."

"I understand," Mabel replies.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"You don't... sound like it."

Dipper's biting his lip, waiting out the silence. He can hear a static-y sigh on the other end.

"I'm gonna visit for winter break, Dips," Mabel says calmly. "I got a ride sorted out."

Dipper perks up.

"Yeah? How?"

"I guess Bill really wants us to be together for Christmas."

Oh. Ohh, that explains her mood. Wait--no, it doesn't.

"Bill?" Dipper says, slight alarm in his voice. He grabs the phone tighter. "He visited you? Did he do anything?"

"He just wanted to talk and--you know--be Bill."

"Annoying and vaguely threatening?" Dipper smiles weakly.

"You got it," Mabel replies, a breathy little laugh on the end. "I guess I just... I understand why you chose to just roll with it."

"For now," Dipper adds. "He's pretty dead set on this, but that doesn't mean we can't turn it into our advantage. He's shown his hand and now we just figure out what to do next."

There's another muffled noise, probably Mabel pawing at the phone or changing hands.

"I dunno, Dipper, I'm sorta at a loss here. I'm not used to treating dating like--like a game of chess. Cat and mouse. That's how you and Bill talk about this. Like we're still enemies."

"We are," Dipper says, frowning.

"Mnh," Mabel answers. "Anyway, Bill left hours ago. So I guess you can expect him around like, whenever."

Dipper shortly glances at the unfinished summoning circle assembled on the floor.

"That's good," he says awkwardly.

"This is really weird, Dipper," Mabel says. "I'm glad I get to see you and our Grunkles, but I kinda wish it wasn't because of Bill Cipher."

"I've been reading up on demons, lately," Dipper says. "While I'm not sure how useful a lot of the stuff will be against Bill--he doesn't seem like the typical Jewish or Catholic demon--I do have a lot of things I'll be able to try out if he causes trouble."

Mabel laughs faintly on the other end.

"So that's why you wanna be 'courted'. To have an excuse to throw holy water in his water."

Dipper shrugs, happy with the positive reaction. "Hey, I'm going to get notes one way or the other. With you here, we'll be able to look out for each other."

"Yeah, I really miss you, you big-headed twerp," Mabel says warmly.

"I miss you too, crazy flakes," Dipper chuckles.

"I can't wait to punch you in the shoulder again."

"I can't wait to hide all your make-up."

"Jerk!"

"Nutjob!"

"See you soon!"

"Not soon enough," Dipper replies, and presses the button to end the call. He stares at the display, call duration and re-dial buttons shining back at him in the dim afternoon light of the attic room. Talking to Mabel always puts him at some relative ease.

"That's _precious!"_ Bill says, hovering a few inches above Dipper's shoulder.

Dipper throws his phone across the roof as he flails and spins around in his chair.

"Bill, _holy fuck!"_

The triangle blinks happily at Dipper, hand shining blue as he stops the phone from splintering against the wooden shingles and lowers it to his tiny, black hand.

"Y'ello," Bill says, tone as smug and irritating as ever. "I heard you talking about me and my ears were all a-burnin'," he points at Dipper's ears, suddenly ablaze with blue, magical fire.

Dipper scowls, and quickly pats himself down, dissipating the fire.

"You were eavesdropping," the twin translates. "Fantastic. You have no regard for privacy, do you?"

"Hah! What a joke," Bill says, phone activating above his outstretched palm. It flashes, and the screen flicks rapidly between dozens of images, some gone in a blur, but most of them visible as notable social sites. "Humans get so bent out of shape about 'privacy' and 'invading of their personal space', but give them one of these doodads and you all fall over yourselves to share embarrassing snippets and pictures of your dull, mortal lives to all the other dull mortals. Nice trunks, Skinny-Dips, didn't fancy you for a magenta type, but I guess you don't look half bad," Cipher remarks, eye squinting as he stops the phone on a series of pictures from the time Mabel dragged Dipper off to a Spring Break spent on the beach.

Dipper goes from pale to beet-red in a few seconds, and jumps at the phone desperately.

"Give that back, you friggin' piece of--"

Bill hovers annoyingly out of reach, lying flat against one of the supporting logs of the roof.

"Hah, this is _great_ \--you're so pale in these you could reflect sunlight and be utilised as a barbaric tool of distraction. Been hittin' the books a bit too hard, kid?" Bill sniggers and drops the phone nonchalantly to the side, leaving Dipper to lunge for it.

 _"Whoff,"_ he coughs, landing belly-first on the carpet. "Great, glad you're having fun, when can you leave?"

"Don't tell me you weren't itching to see me," Bill replies, hovering down in a seductively lounging pose, leaning against one spindly little arm. "Hmm?" he prompts.

Dipper pushes off of the floor, and sits with his knees folded. "Never, ever, absolutely _not."_

"Oh-ho? Then what's this?" Bill replies, pointing suspiciously at the summoning circle drawn in chalk on the floor. "Looks like my number, Pine tree. You tryin' to call long-distance? You know I'm always just in your reach."

"That's _super_ creepy coming from you," Dipper snarls. "And that," he says, crawling to the circle and rubbing at it with the flat of his palm. "Was a mistake. I should've known you would just roll around in your time, regardless of me trying to reach you in a way we could be equal."

Bill's eyes scrunches up in merriment. "Do tell-- _equals?"_

"The summoning rite," Dipper grits out. "You're bound to it."

"Sureeee," Bill replies sarcastically. "The same way you're bound to politely answer your phone to noisy telemarketers."

"It's in the runes," Dipper insist, albeit a bit confused. "You're bound to answer and hear out a person's request--"

Bill Cipher barks out a laugh before hovering down and elbowing Dipper, whispering nonchalantly.

"Who do you think wrote that, hmm? It couldn't be someone wanting to give humans the silly idea that they have any power over me whatsoever, could it?"

Dipper throws up his hands. "Great, everything you say is a lie, and we're back to square one."

"Square one being?" Bill asks, seemingly out of politeness rather than any real interest.

"Why are you here?" Dipper asks, setting his jaw in determination. "I was going to summon you because I thought I'd better tell you not to mess with Mabel if she doesn't want anything to do with you, but you're not the kinda... object... whatever, to take 'no' for an answer, are you? Why are you here, then?"

"Hurtful," Bill sniffs, wiping away a single tear. "And, of course, _absolutely_ true! Although, my li'l _tête-a-tête_ with Shooting Star was most informative. Apparently fresh trophies and prizes of prowess don't really set the _bow-chica-bow-wow mood_ for you earthlings the same way it does demons, so--!"

The demon holds out his hand, and in a blaze of light, a little envelope materialize.

Bill hand it over to a hesitant Dipper with a flourish of his wrist.

 _"Voilà_ , kiddos, you want to be _properly_ _romanced?_ Here's your flippin' romance!"

Dipper picks the envelope out of Bill's hand, half expecting it to erupt into flames or spew Anthrax all over him for Bill's sick idea of a prank.

He turns it over, frowning. There's a little wax seal covering the back, with an avatar of Bill's Eye in the middle. It has a little black heart for a pupil and stares back endlessly. Unblinking.

"Uh, Bill...?" Dipper begins, a very bad feeling creeping up his neck.

"Haha! Prepare to be courted conventionally and acceptably within human standards, Pines Twins," Bill exclaims dramatically, and departs into a blink of light and nasally laughter.

Dipper's mouth hangs open. He turns the envelopes again, and in a creepy-crawly scribble-y font, black ink forms a simple set of sentence on the front of both:

_You are cordially invited to a formal rendezvous with the sophisticated demon of your dreams (he knows, he's seen them), you can run, but you can't hide. Also that would be impolite and probably end in dismemberment (yours)._

_With pretenses of human love,_

_B. Cipher_

Dipper stares, trying to make sense of the madness.

Then it hits him.

_A date._

"Oh. Ohhhh, _no."_


End file.
